Kelley Armstrong - Stolen

Stalker-guy rolled from his heels to his toes, muttering under his breath. Down the hall, his companion wiped his sweaty face on his shoulder. He stood, stretched, and crouched again. Several times he tried the door handle, then turned to his partner and shook his head. Finally my stalker waved him back. I quickstepped up three stairs, out of sight. They came into the stairwell and closed the door.

"No go," lock-pick guy said. "I don't get it. I'm sure I popped the lock, but it won't open."

"Dead bolt?"

Lock-pick guy shook his head. "I checked out the place this morning. Old-fashioned key locks."

"Call Tucker. I saw a pay phone out front. Ground line. I'll wait here."

Lock-pick guy trotted down the stairs. As the first-floor door swung shut behind him, I heard another door open, this one on the fourth floor. Stalker-guy cracked open the exit to look down the hall. Then he made a noise deep in his throat, a stifled chuckle. I sneaked down a few steps, crouched again, and looked through the door crack.

Paige Winterbourne stood in the hall, arms folded across her chest, dressed in a green silk chemise and matching wrap. Frowning, she surveyed the corridor. Then she stopped and stared at the exit where we hid. Though the door was open only a couple of inches, she must have seen light or shadow peeking through. As she watched, stalker-guy hesitated, holding the door handle, ready to close it. If she'd gone back into her room to call security, he would have bolted. But she didn't. She narrowed her eyes and started toward us. Yet another horror movie cliché. When the ditzy ingenue hears a bump in the night, does she retreat to safety and phone for help? Of course not. She has to see what's behind that partly open door. All Paige needed now was to lose the negligee, so she could run naked and screaming down the hall when she flung open the door and found the killer lurking behind it.

Stalker-guy broke from the script. Instead of waiting for Paige to throw open the door, he took out his gun and snapped it back together. Then he eased the door open another half-inch and lifted the gun to the door crack. Last year, I'd seen an innocent woman gunned down because of me. Whether Paige was innocent or not was a matter of some debate, but I doubted she deserved to be murdered in a hotel hallway. I leaped over the railing and landed on the man's back. He fell forward. I grabbed his head and twisted his neck. The simplest, quietest, and cleanest kill.

As he dropped face-first to the floor, I looked up to see Paige holding the door open and staring.

"Stand guard," I said. "Is your room unlocked?"

"My-? Umm, yes."

I hoisted the dead man onto my shoulder and pushed past her into the hall. "I said to stand guard. He wasn't alone."

"Where are you-oh, wait. My room? You can't put him-" She stopped. "Take him to the suite next to ours. The near side. It's empty."

"All the better."

"I can unlock the door with a spell," she said.

She hurried down the hallway alongside me, murmuring words in a foreign language. While she was talking, I covered my hand with my shirt, reached over, and snapped the vacant room's doorknob.

"Run back and get the gun," I said. "Then wake your aunt and get in here."

Paige hesitated, like a knee-jerk reaction against taking orders. She seemed to think better of arguing and paused only a second before jogging to the stairwell. I dragged the dead man into the bathroom, closed the door, and checked his pockets for ID. Nothing. Seeing the two-way radio in his pocket reminded me that there was a second gunman, and Paige and her aunt were taking their sweet time evacuating their room.

I opened the bathroom door as they walked into the vacant room. Paige was still wearing her chemise and wrapper. Ruth's long housecoat covered her nightwear. Both carried a change of clothing and their purses, and Paige had the gun.

"Good idea," I said. "Is all your ID in there?"

"No sense leaving them any clues if they break in," Paige said. "If we have to, we can leave the rest of the stuff behind."

"Paige told me what happened," Ruth said. "We're very grateful. Also very impressed. You have excellent reflexes."

"Self-defense classes," I said.

"Still not admitting to the werewolf thing?" Paige asked.

I walked to the bathroom and held open the door. "Either of you ever see this guy before? Don't touch anything. The cops will dust for prints."

"Cops?" Paige repeated.

"Yes, cops. Who do you think will handle the murder investigation? Hotel security?"

"Murder? You mean he's dead?"

"No. He's resting comfortably," I said. "People always sleep best with their heads at a ninety-degree angle. He looks comfortable, doesn't he?"

"There's no need for sarcasm," Paige said tightly. "Maybe you're used to hauling corpses around, but I'm not."

"Sheltered life. You're supposed to be a witch and you've never had to kill anyone?"

Paige's voice tightened another notch. "We use alternate methods of defense."

"Like what? Cast a spell to make your attackers think happy thoughts? Turn their guns into flowers? Peace and love for all?"

"I'd have used a binding spell," Paige said. "Kept the guy alive so we could question him. Wow. There's a novel idea. If you hadn't killed him, maybe we could have talked to him."

"Oh, that's right. Paige's ultra-efficient binding spell. Tell you what. Next time I see a guy pointing a gun at you, I'll let you do things your way. You start your invocation and see if you can finish before he guns you down. Deal?"

Paige lifted the gun, opened it, removed a tranquilizer dart, and held it up. "No one wanted to kill me."

"Are you sure about that?" a male voice asked.

Paige and I jumped. Even Ruth looked up, startled. In the corner of the bedroom stood a man dressed in the same black fatigues as the dead man on the floor. He was of average height and weight, with average brown hair cut short but not military short. Only one distinguishing feature-a paper-thin scar running from temple to nose-assured me I'd never seen this man before. I glanced toward the hall door. It was still closed and locked. Paige's change of clothing lay undisturbed in front of it. So how'd this guy get in?

"I'm glad to hear you wouldn't have killed poor Mark," the man said, sitting on the edge of the bed, stretching his legs and crossing his ankles. "Very sporting of you. I guess what they say about witches is true. So selfless, so concerned for others, so unbelievably naive."

I stepped toward him.

"Don't! "Paige hissed.

"This is the werewolf?" The man turned dirt-brown eyes on me in a smirking once-over. "Better than I expected. So, are you coming along, wolf-girl? Or do things have to get"-his smirk broadened to a grin-"physical."

I glanced at Paige and Ruth.

"Oh, they're coming too," the man said. "But I'm not worried about them. Only witches, you know. They'll do what they're told."

Paige made a noise in her throat, but Ruth laid a restraining hand on her arm.

"So you're kidnapping us?" I asked.

The man yawned. "Looks that way, doesn't it?"

"What's in it for you?" Paige asked.

"See?" The man looked at me. "That's witches for you. Make me feel guilty. Appeal to my kinder, gentler side. Which might work, if I had one."

"So you're working for Ty Winsloe?" I said.

"Oh, come on, ladies. As much as I'd love to chat about my motivations and the Yankees' chances at the World Series-"

I lunged at him, sailing the five feet between us. My hands went out, ready to catch him in the chest and topple him backward. But they didn't. Instead I hit empty air and tumbled onto the bed, twisting fast to right myself before the counterattack. It didn't come. I whirled around to see the man standing by the bedroom door, the same bored expression on his face.